Sixkill

by Robert B. Parker

  "Quiet on the set."

  "Rolling for picture."

  "And action."

  The limo slid into view again as the camera tracked it. The director was looking at a small monitor as it rolled. The car stopped. Jumbo got out. An airplane went past overhead.

  "Cut."

  "Scene eighteen, take three."

  Shepherded by the detail cop, the limo backed up out of sight. I'd been around movie sets before. They'd do this all morning. I asked a production assistant with a clipboard where I could find Zebulon Sixkill.

  "He's over there," she said. "By the camera. He likes to watch the shot in the monitor."

  She had blond streaks in her hair and looked to be about twenty-three. I thanked her and started over.

  "Z's got kind of a short fuse."

  "I'll be careful," I said.

  I walked over by the camera and stood silently beside Zebulon Sixkill while Jumbo did his walk for the fifth time.

  When he disappeared into the subway entrance, the director said, "Cut. It's a keeper."

  Jumbo came back out.

  "For crissake, Vaughn, it was five takes to get a fucking walk?"

  "Want to get it right, Jumbo," the director said.

  Jumbo looked at the spectators.

  "Fucking directors," he said, with a lot of projection. "Won't do one take when five are almost as good."

  A few spectators tittered. The director ignored him. He was already conferring with the first assistant director about the next shot.

  "I'm going to craft services," Jumbo said. "Z?"

  Zebulon Sixkill started after Jumbo. I went with him. As he had in Wellesley, he walked carefully, as if the ground was slippery.

  "Zebulon?" I said.

  He was watching Jumbo, in case some crazed fan jumped out and assaulted him for his autograph.

  He said, "Call me Z."

  "Okay, Z, can we talk for a few minutes?"

  He looked at me.

  "You," he said.

  "Me."

  "What the fuck?" he said.

  "Wanted to ask you what happened to Dawn Lopata," I said.

  "Don't know shit. Now take a walk or I'll mess you up."

  "You were in the next room when she died," I said.

  Jumbo saw me.

  "Z, who you fucking talking to," he said.

  "The asshole I threw out of Wellesley," Z said.

  "So throw him off the set, too," Jumbo said. "And throw him off hard. I'm sick of him."

  The detail cop was up Tremont Street, dealing with the traffic disruption that the drive up had caused. It was gonna be me and Z.

  Z said, "Move it."

  He put both hands on my chest and shoved me. He was strong. I took a step back.

  He took me by the lapels with both hands. Up close, he smelled of booze.

  Ten-thirty in the morning?

  "I told you, move," he said.

  I clamped my left forearm over both his hands, which pinned them to my chest. Then in a sort of leisurely way, I brought my right arm up and back and drove my elbow into his face. He bent backward. I brought the same right hand around and hit him on the right temple with the side of my clenched fist. His knees buckled. I let his hands go and pushed him away. He stumbled back a couple of steps. His head was down, and he shook it as if things weren't in place. Then he lunged at me. I put out a straight left and he ran into it, and I followed with a right cross that put him down. He was on his hands and knees. Again, he shook his head a little and started to get up. I let him. When he was on his feet, I waited. He rocked a bit, and then came at me again with a wild right hand. I checked the punch with my left hand, blocked it with my right, and slid outside the punch. I kept hold of his arm with my right, holding him at the juncture of hand and wrist so he couldn't twist loose. I pulled him slightly forward so he was off balance and hit him with three left hooks into his exposed kidney area. He gasped. I jerked him forward hard and he went down, face-first. He stayed there for a minute and then, painfully, he started to get up. I had to give him points for tough.

  "Stay down," I said. "You couldn't beat me sober, and you got no chance drunk."

  He got himself onto his hands and knees, almost feeling for the ground as he started to inch one leg under him.

  "Z," I said. "So far I've just been discouraging you. You keep coming and I'm gonna have to hurt you."

  He got both feet under him, and like someone doing a clean and jerk too heavy for him, he forced himself upright and faced me. He put his hands up in front of his face as if he could box. Which he couldn't. He stuck a feeble left out at me. I leaned away from it. He followed with an aimless right cross, which I leaned away from in the other direction. He stood, then, with both hands up again, in front of his face. His eyes looked blank. Then, quite suddenly, without any visible volition, he sat down on the ground. Our dance was done.

  "You fucking wimp," Jumbo yelled at him. "You let this fucking local keyhole sniffer kick your ass."

  Z simply sat. If he heard Jumbo, he gave no sign.

  "Fucking loser," Jumbo said. "When you can get your sorry ass off the ground, take a goddamned hike. I don't want to see you again. You're fired."

  The detail cop came through the crowd that had gathered.

  "What's going on," he said.

  "My bodyguard, ex-bodyguard, is a fucking coward, that's what," Jumbo said.

  "He's not a coward," I said to Jumbo. "He's hurt."

  "You put him down?" the detail cop said.

  "We were sparring," I said. "It got out of hand."

  "My name's Ed Keohane," the cop said. "I know you?"

  "Spenser," I said. "I'm a private license."

  "Yeah, I know who you are," the cop said. "Aren't you pals with the homicide commander?"

  "Captain Quirk," I said. "Sort of."

  The cop bent over Z.

  "You got anything to say?"

  Z shook his head.

  "You want to press charges or anything?"

  Z shook his head.

  "You need an ambulance?"

  Z shook his head. The cop felt his pulse for a minute and straightened up.

  "Anyplace he can rest, until he's got himself together?" he said.

  "We could put him in Jumbo's trailer," the first AD said.

  "Like hell," Jumbo said. "I'm done with him. Fucking fraud. Claimed he was tough."

  "He is tough," I said. "He kept coming a long time after he should have stopped."

  "So how come he's on the ground?" Jumbo said.

  "He's tough enough," I said. "He just can't fight very well."

  "Put him in my trailer," the director said.

  The cop and I helped Z to his feet and, one on each side, we walked him to the trailer. The director opened the door and we brought him in and laid him out on the bed. The young PA I had talked to before came in.

  "I'll stay with him," she said.

  I looked at Z. He looked back at me. There was consciousness in his eyes. I nodded slightly and turned and left.

  Outside, the ADs were getting everybody back to work. Jumbo was still there. He was eating a large cinnamon bun.

  "You want a job?" he said.

  "Working for you?" I said.

  He took a big bite of his cinnamon bun and chewed it while he spoke.

  "Good money, lotta starstruck pussy," he said.

  "No," I said.

  "Why not?"

  "Don't like you," I said.

  "Oh, fuck," Jumbo said. "Nobody likes me, but everybody likes money and snatch, and I got plenty of both. Chemicals, too, you like that."

  "No," I said.

  "I need a bodyguard," Jumbo said. "You're good. What'll it take."

  "No," I said, and started away.

  "For crissake, at least gimme a fucking reason," Jumbo said.

  I paused and turned back.

  "I think you're a repellent puke," I said, and walked away across the Common.

  Zebulon Sixkill II

  By h
is freshman year in high school, Zebulon was six feet two inches tall. He discovered the weight room, and by sophomore year he weighed 210 pounds and was an all-county running back. By senior year he weighed 240 and was considered the best running back in the state. The newspapers started calling him "The Cree named Z," and the recruiters arrived in force. Bob and Zebulon talked to each of them in the neat kitchen of Bob's cabin.

  The recruiter from California Wesleyan was a very rich alumnus named Patrick Calhoun who had been an all-American tackle at Cal Wesleyan thirty years ago. He was a large man, gone to fat, and very pleasant. He told Zebulon to call him Pat. He told Bob he'd be like a father to Zebulon while Z was at the university, and reminded both of them that four members of last year's Rose Bowl team had been drafted by the National Football League in the first two rounds. Zebulon and Bob talked it over for two days and opted for Pat Calhoun.

  By the end of his first season he was starting as the feature back in Cal Wesleyan's pro-style offense. Pat Calhoun paid Zebulon's tuition and gave him money every week. He bought Zebulon a Mustang convertible. Bob couldn't afford to come to the games, so Pat arranged for a video of each week's game to be sent to him. Zebulon called Bob the day after every game, and they often talked for an hour. Two weeks before the beginning of Zebulon's sophomore year, Bob died. Zebulon was two weeks late coming back to college.

  He sat in the football office with the head coach, Harmon Stockard, and Pat Calhoun, whom Stockard, with a smile, referred to as "one of the owners."

  "I want you to take your time," Stockard said. "You're not ready to play, that's okay. We can redshirt you for a year."

  "I can play," Zebulon said.

  "Z," Calhoun said, "think about it. The level we all need you to perform. It takes a ton of focus."

  "I can play."

  "Be sure," Stockard said. "You owe it to yourself, and you owe it to me, and you owe it to the team. We go into the season with you, and you're not ready . . ."

  "I can focus," Zebulon said.

  The first game he played after Bob's death he ran for 136 yards and two touchdowns.

  11

  DAWN HAD TWO FRIENDS with her the day she met Jumbo. I met them for lunch in the food court of the Galleria near Lechmere Square, close to the community college, which was just across the Gilmore Bridge. One friend was a girl with maroon hair cut short and square across her forehead. The other was a boy with an earring and one of those hairdos where it looks like you just rolled out of bed. They both wore black: jeans, sweatshirts, sneakers. The girl had on a lot of dark eye makeup. They weren't exactly goths. But they weren't a couple of management trainees, either.

  When they came to my table carrying a cup of coffee each, the girl said, "Are you the detective."

  "Am I sitting alone, wearing a dark blue Braves hat with a red brim and white B on the front?" I said.

  "Yeah."

  "Then it must be me," I said.

  They sat down. The girl's name was Christine. The boy was James.

  "My treat," I said. "You want anything."

  "I just want coffee," James said.

  "Just coffee," Christine said.

  "Cheap date," I said. "Tell me about Dawn and Jumbo Nelson."

  "You got a gun?" Christine said.

  "Yep."

  "On you?" she said.

  "Yep."

  James did a mock shiver and said, "Oooo!"

  "You ever shoot anybody?" Christine said.

  "Being a detective," I said, "I'm sort of used to asking the questions. Tell me about Dawn and Jumbo."

  The big room was full of people, mostly adolescents, eating pizza, lamb on a skewer, and sweet-and-sour chicken with red and green maraschino cherries in it. I might have been the oldest person in the room.

  "We gonna get paid for telling you stuff?" Christine said.

  "No."

  "I thought snitches got paid," James said.

  "Not by me," I said.

  Christine shrugged.

  "Never hurts to ask," Christine said.

  "It might," I said.

  Christine shrugged again, more elaborately this time.

  "We was watching them make the movie," Christine said. "And, you know, Jumbo spotted us, and come over."

  James took out a pack of filter-tip cigarettes and lit one, and put the pack on the table. He inhaled deeply, held the smoke for a moment, and exhaled slowly. He held the cigarette between his first two fingers, up near the top joint.

  "And he says to us, something like, how you like it so far?"

  "Was he interested in Dawn right away?" I said.

  "He was interested in all three of us," James said.

  "You, too?" I said.

  "Uh-huh."

  "Was his interest carnal?" I said.

  "Sure," James said.

  "And you?" I said to Christine. "He interested in you?"

  "Oh, yeah," she said. "Me and Dawn."

  "And it was carnal?"

  "You mean did he want us to screw him?" Christine said. "Yeah, sure. He wanted to hook up with all three of us."

  "He say so?"

  "Uh-huh," James said.

  He took a card from his pocket and put it face up on the table. Christine took out a card just like it. On the front it said "Jumbo." I turned the cards over. The hotel name and room number were written on the back, along with a phone number.

  "That's his cell phone number," James said.

  "Dawn got one, too?" I said.

  "Sure," Christine said.

  She picked up James's cigarettes, took one, put it in her mouth, and leaned toward James. He lit it for her, and she inhaled and let the smoke out slowly, with her lower lip forward so the smoke drifted up in front of her face. Dramatic. I wondered how often she'd practiced. It was odd to sit with two people smoking. I had quit years ago, and it was odd even to see people smoking. Smoking was mostly something done by some shivering isolate outside an office building in the winter.

  "He focus in on her?" I said.

  "Nope," James said. "He was ready for any of us."

  I said, "It doubles the dating pool, I guess."

  "You interested?" James said.

  "No."

  "You don't find me attractive?" James said.

  "Stunning," I said. "But not my type."

  "What's your type?" James said.

  He was having fun.

  "Female," I said.

  "You married?" Christine said.

  "I keep steady company with the girl of my dreams," I said.

  "So I don't interest you, either?" she said.

  "Sadly," I said, "no."

  "Because of your girlfriend?"

  "Exactly," I said.

  In fact, of course, I had never been aroused by anyone with maroon hair.

  "That's amazing," Christine said.

  James grinned.

  "Old school," he said.

  "So how come Dawn was the one ended up in Jumbo's hotel room?" I said.

  "Too fat for me," James said.

  He dropped his cigarette butt on the floor and stepped on it.

  "Christine?" I said.

  She squinched up her face.

  "Gross," she said.

  "But Dawn liked him?" I said.

  "Dawn wasn't choosy who she hooked up with," James said.

  He lit a new cigarette.

  "And for crissake," Christine said, "he was a freaking movie star. You know?"

  "She would care about that?" I said.

  "Of course," Christine said. "Who wouldn't."

  "You?" I said.

  "Sure," she said. "But he's too icky."

  "But not too icky for Dawn," I said.

  "No."

  "Why not," I said.

  They were silent for a moment. James let the smoke from his new cigarette drift out through his nose.

  "Not many people too icky for Dawn," he said.

  I looked at Christine. She shrugged.

  "Dawn wasn't choosy," she said. "She was a good
kid, but she, you know, went for pretty much anybody with a winkie."

  "A winkie?" I said.

  "You know," Christine said.

  I nodded.

  "So what do you think happened with her and Jumbo?" I said.

  She shrugged and took another cigarette from James's pack. He lit it for her.

  "I think it was kinky sex, got out of hand," James said.

  "Anything special?" I said.

  "Said in the papers that she died of asphyxiation," James said.

  "I know," I said.

  "That right?" he said.

  "They're not sure," I said.

  "Well, if it is . . ." James spread his arms as if it was a nobrainer.

  "She into choking games?" I said.

  "Got me," James said.

  "Christine?" I said.

  "I don't know," Christine said. "She was very interested in all kinds of sex stuff."

  "Aren't we all," I said.

  "We're kids," James said. "We're even more interested."

  "Ageist," I said.

  "And," Christine said, "I think she might have been more interested than most."

  12

  I STOPPED ON MY WAY back to the office to get a sub sandwich. When I got back to my office, it was nearly two in the afternoon. I found Zebulon Sixkill, fragrant with booze, asleep on the floor in front of my office. I stepped over him, unlocked my door, and opened it. I put my sandwich on my desk and went back and got hold of Zebulon Sixkill by the collar and dragged him into the office and laid him out on my office rug. I stepped back over him again and shut my office door, then made some coffee, poured myself a cup, and sat at my desk with my feet up, eating my sandwich and drinking my coffee. When I got through, I wrote some bills and put them in envelopes and stamped them.

  At about three-thirty the sun had moved out over the Charles River, five blocks away. It slanted in through my office window, making a long parallelogram on the floor where Zebulon Sixkill was lying on his back. It woke him up.

  "Where the fuck am I," he said.

  His voice was very hoarse.

  "My office," I said.

  "Who the fuck are you?"

  "Spenser," I said. "We met, couple days ago."

  He raised his head and looked at me. I smiled in a friendly way.